


I caught the darkness

by RobberBaroness



Category: Darkest Dungeon (Video Game)
Genre: F/M, Hallucinations, Hurt/Comfort
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-25
Updated: 2019-09-25
Packaged: 2020-10-28 09:00:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 438
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20775950
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RobberBaroness/pseuds/RobberBaroness
Summary: The things Audrey remembers while infected with the Blood can't be real.  They simply can't.





	I caught the darkness

“Are you still there?” Audrey asked Dismas through the walls of her room. It wasn’t a cell- she was no prisoner, she’d gone to be cured of her malady voluntarily- but the door was locked all the same, and she could not see if her visitor had left her.

“I’m still here,” Dismas said. “You’re going to be alright. We saw Reynaud cured just last month. The infection starves itself out with enough time and care.”

“I know...I know...but I’m so frightened. My mind is all wrong. Dismas, do you ever have cruel memories?”

Her visitor was silent for long enough that she had to call out to him again.

“You know I do,” he said curtly.

“That isn’t what I- I’m having memories of the courtyard. Of those parties. Those dreadful parties. I never went, I would have been far too young, all the parties I did go to when I was a fine lady were terribly dull, but I’m remembering them. I can hear the music they played, I can smell that sickly wine, and there are things I can remember doing-”

Audrey’s voice grew quiet, as if holding back tears.

“You know I’m not wicked. I’m not.”

“No more than the rest of us,” Dismas replied.

“No, that isn’t true. I’m greedy and I’m snobbish and I’m selfish but I’m not cruel. I’ve never been cruel. I would never hurt someone for the pleasure of it, not in a way they couldn’t recover from. Please, Dismas, tell me I’m not cruel!”

“You’ve never been cruel to me. More than that, I cannot say.”

“But you must say!” her voice rang out from the room. “You must tell me I didn’t attend those parties, I didn’t take my pleasure out on helpless victims, I didn’t drink the blood of a butchered woman! I was too young, I didn’t even know the Darkest family! Please, tell me the things I’m remembering aren’t true.”

Dismas searched for the most honest thing he could say.

“They probably aren’t true, if that makes you feel any better. You don’t look old enough to have gone to those parties, unless you’ve aged very well indeed. I wouldn’t doubt that the infection carries with it hallucinations. Does that satisfy you?”

There was a whimper of assent from the infirmary room.

“Please, Dismas. Please stay with me until they make you leave. You don’t have to talk, I just have to know you’re there.”

Dismas stretched out his legs in the corridor.

“I’ll stay, my dear. Just be sure you do the same for me when I catch this blasted thing.”


End file.
